Tonight’s Tyne Tees… in 1984

The TVTimes gives us a run down of Tyne Tees Television programmes for Monday 16 April 1984. Things worth noting include:

TV-am, still in financial bother, comes on at 6.25am. The Good Morning Britain schedule is crowded with little items or “spots” – popular with viewers but ripe with material for comedians: “At 9.15, an in-depth look at breast cancer. Then, at 9.17, it’s over to Mad Lizzie”.

It’s the Easter school holidays in England, so there’s no educational programmes on ITV and the replacement programmes are family-friendly.

The Laurel and Hardy film at 11.20am is a 1932 talkie, Any Old Port.

The regional variations are just weird. Not the drift between companies – that’s to be expected in the 1980s – but the choice of neighbouring regions. I can’t work out where you can stand in the Tyne Tees area and receive Grampian, especially without getting Scottish as well.

Judi at 1.30pm has a host of second-string stars willing to travel to Plymouth to be on TSW during the day.

The Monday Matinee is 1960’s No Kidding, released in the States as Beware of Children. It’s a fair enough Rogers-Thomas-Hudis romp, ideal for the timeslot.

Miracles Take Longer at 3.30pm is a soapy drama set in a Citizens Advice Bureau. It didn’t last long, being replaced by Gems and ultimately by the rash of cheap Australian soaps – Sons and Daughters, The Young Doctors, The Sullivans – that ITV found useful to shove in this slot.

I miss Charlotte Coleman (3 April 1968 – 14 November 2001).

Mr Smith at 5.15pm features a talking orangutang. Just as terrible as that implies, it was cancelled by a flailing NBC after 11 episodes in 1983.

What’s My Line? at 7pm is one of those programmes that TV can’t leave alone – it’s so very cheap to make and always does moderately well with audiences, meaning that it’s in profit after the first advertisement. It ran on BBCtv 1951-1963 with Eamonn Andrews in the chair, then on BBC-2 with David Jacobs 1973-1974, 1984-1987 on ITV with Andrews again, 1987-1990 with Angela Rippon, then 1994-1996 on ITV with Emma Forbes.

The Kit Curran Radio Show at 8pm ran for one series of 6 episodes in 1984 and another series, again of 6 episodes, under the shortened title Kit Curran in 1986. Both series enjoyed a later life on rotation filling the 24-hour ITV schedules of the late 1980s.

Over on Channel 4, the station isn’t on air until 5pm – an hour later than usual during the tough advertising recession of the time – with a very, very early-C4 Jeremy Isaacs schedule, quite unlike anything you’d see on television today.

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13 responses to this article

Jeremy Rogers wrote16 April 2016 at 9:16 pm

Grampian Television – a few coastal parts of the Tyne Tees area facing in the right direction could at this time receive Grampian from Durris, across the sea. Whether enough people actually did to justify it being in the TV Times is another matter.

Martin Jarvis wrote16 April 2016 at 9:35 pm

Regarding the regional variations, I used to think the same, until I went to Redcar and found I could get a decent picture from Grampian there. Probably something to do with the way the North-East Scotland juts out giving a clear path over the sea to the North- England coast.

Dave Rhodes wrote16 April 2016 at 11:03 pm

Tyne Tees’ 0925 news headlines were unusual in the network at the time – I wonder if anyone did switch on for a minute’s summary between children’s programmes? Still, at least they made an effort.

Feels odd to see Laurel and Hardy pop up as an ITV filler – always associated in my mind with that 1735 slot on BBC2.

Looks like this was the final series of Gambit, Tom O’Connor presumably having taken over from Fred Dinenage because of the latter’s TVS commitments. Later in 1984, and again in 85, Tom presided over a couple of series of the Zodiac Game for Anglia.

Tyne Tees opting to run the regional magazine programme at 6.30 – something Central/ATV and Granada tried at various times. One of the trade papers – possibly Media Week? – used to publish regionalised top tens – would be interesting to see which companies’ magazines fared best.

Briefing at 2232 looks ambitious – per The Times listings, it seems a fortnightly thing.

Wouldn’t be Tyne Tees without an epilogue; indeed, they ran a prologue too, for many years.

Over on 4, note Beverley Anderson picking up an onscreen gig after her ill-fated Sixty Minutes adventure on BBC1.

By the way, when our family holidayed in Seahouses, Northumberland, in the early 80s, North Sound’s mw service was almost as strong as Metro’s, so a TTT/Grampian ‘overlap’ area may not be inconceivable!

Paul Mason wrote17 April 2016 at 5:54 am

The revival of What’s My Line is both sad and interesting. The panel contained Ernie Wise and Eric Morecambe separately and this was EMs final TV show and he was decidedly poorly looking at the time. At the end of this first show Eamonn Andrews said “Sleep well Tommy Cooper”- he had died on live TV the night before. Eric Morecambe himself succumbed after a live off TV show six weeks later, on the same day as ex ITN newscaster Reginald Bosanquet. Morecambe, in poor health was deeply affected by Tommy Coopers death. 1984 saw off Diana Does and Leonard Rossiter. By the way Penelope Keith chaired the daytime ITV WML between Angela Rippon and Emma Forbes.BBC4 screened a one off WML with Hugh Dennis as chair.

Paul Mason wrote17 April 2016 at 5:56 am

Diana Dors I meant.

Aidan Lunn wrote17 April 2016 at 12:13 pm

Notice the repeat of ATV drama series “Thriller” at 11:15.

I wonder if it was the ATV original or the US edit packaged by ITC?

Arthur Vasey wrote17 April 2016 at 3:10 pm

Aidan – it was the US version – its original title was The Next Voice You See – featuring an almost-unrecognisable Bradford Dillman – spends almost all of the episode in dark glasses!

MIRACLES TAKE LONGER: This series only lasted one short season – set in an office that was the Citizens Advice Bureau in all but name!

AFTERNOON AND MORNING MOVIES: In the case of afternoon movies, prior to the Australian soap opera takeover, these were a staple diet of Monday and (when there was no racing on) Friday afternoons throughout the 70s – as for morning movies, they were mostly on during holiday times (typically summer) – shown, surprisingly, without ad breaks – they had other regular programming as well – if there was a natural break, they would put public information films on.

LOCAL NEWS AT 6:30 – For a number of years, Tyne Tees put out Crossroads at 6, Tuesday to Thursday, with Northern Life at 6:30 – Monday and Friday was, depending on Tyne-Tees’s mood, either a quiz or a long-forgotten, short-lived US sitcom!

Steven Oliver wrote17 April 2016 at 11:35 pm

Interesting to see that Border’s local evening magazine and the Tyne Tees “what’s on” featurette shared the same title – Lookaround, although both were of course completely different programmes.

Arthur Nibble wrote18 April 2016 at 1:39 pm

Charlotte Coleman managed an impressive array of film and TV work in such a short life. She didn’t have it easy – depression, bulimia, anorexia and eventually a fatal asthma attack.

Arthur Nibble wrote18 April 2016 at 1:50 pm

Sorry, me again.

Children’s ITV anchor Christopher (“Where’s”) Biggins had recently appeared in the penultimate series of kids’ show “On Safari” – all together now – “Safari, so goody!”

I didn’t realise Derek Hobson flitted round ITV stations and channels. I remember him from ATV’s “New Faces” and TSW’s “That’s My Dog” (though I wish I didn’t, especially the latter) and didn’t know he’d hosted a Thames show for Channel 4.

An hour’s programme covering all four days’ action from the US Masters on Channel 4! A bit different to the coverage these days.

Arthur Nibble wrote18 April 2016 at 9:06 pm

Cover star Finola Hughes won several awards for roles in daytime soaps later in her career but, in 1984, she was bouncing back from two Golden Raspberry (Razzie) nominations for her part in the debacle that was the “Saturday Night Fever” sequel “Staying Alive”.

Joanne Gray wrote19 April 2016 at 8:24 pm

I had no idea Larry the Lamb was still being shown then. I thought ITV stopped screening it in the late 70s?

Robert Clark wrote18 October 2016 at 9:31 pm

Nobody noticed the sports action on Channel 4? Highlights of the US Masters golf. 8pm on Monday evening.